


Seductive As Cabbage

by Coffee_Buzzed



Series: Clad In Black (And Various Other Colors) [4]
Category: No Fandom, Original Work
Genre: Asexual Character, Bad Flirting, Furry, Humor, Prompt Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-15
Updated: 2019-02-15
Packaged: 2019-10-25 12:22:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17725112
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Coffee_Buzzed/pseuds/Coffee_Buzzed
Summary: Zira is going to need to flirt as a distraction , but there is a tiny problem with that plan. Ajax wants to help, and Ruger is having the time of his life on the other end of the COM.





	Seductive As Cabbage

It was dark in the city. Clouds covered the moon and stars, making the streets seem even more hostile than before. The only source of light were the flickering street lights and headlights from the rare car that drove by. It was late enough that most were asleep, tucked under blankets and hugging their pillows close to them. Even though the streets seemed dead, this was indeed not the case. Although it was the heinous hour of roughly 2am, boots bounded across the concrete roof.

  The steps were light and quick, barely making a sound. The figure barely paused as she jumped from the roof onto another, this one belonging to an old rundown apartment. The figure was joined by a second as she landed. The two assassins made their way to the edge of the building and looked down to a smaller one. From their vantage point, they could see as tiny silhouettes moved in and out of the structure. None of them bothered to look up to where Ajax and Zira were peering down, and even if they did, they probably wouldn't have seen them. The shadows kept them hidden.

  At this point in her career, Zira counted the darkness as one of her friends. It was special relationship - an Assassin and the Darkness. Zira had a good relationship with the blackness. The Shadows kept her hidden from prying eyes, allowing her to carry out her work in peace. Well...peace was a weird term.  An assassin's job was never peaceful. 

  " _ The building seems well fortified. I wouldn't be able to tell you for certain yet, but from what I’m able to gather from the cams, there are about four guards per entrance. _ " Ruger's voice buzzed through the ear piece Zira wore. 

  "Any windows we can get through?" Ajax responded to the dragon first.

  " _ Unfortunately no. They're all closed. I suppose you could always break one but that would draw them up to you. _ "

  "Shit," Zira muttered under her breath, "I really don't feel like taking on a small army tonight."

  Ajax shrugged, his purple-tufted tail waving slightly in the air. "We could take them. It would be no problem!"

    Zira gave an annoyed look to the hybrid. She loved the cat-monster like a brother, but sometimes he really overlooked the significant details. 

  "Maybe YOU can but you also weren't the one that took a bullet to the shoulder last month."

   Ajax ruffled his hand through the wolf's head fur. Zira playfully swatted his hand away and gave him a glare.

  "You're the one that wanted to come help me take down sharky boy and wouldn't take no for an answer!"

  "That's called being a good partner asshole!"

  The sibling-like bickering was cut short by Ruger.

  " _ Now that's all very well but its 2:16  and I'm only running on a can of Redbull  I had this afternoon."  _

  The two assassins returned their attention to the building and its inhabitants. They stared in silent thought at the scene, each trying to map out plans in their head. Zira was drawing a blank.

  “We’re going to have to distract them. If you take care of that, I can sneak inside and pour the gas.” Ajax said in a thoughtful tone.

  “And how do you propose I do that? Like I said, my shoulder isn't doing too well. I don't want to tear the stitches. Kyla is already going to chew me out for coming on this job at all!”

  Ajax turned to look at her. 

  “It'll be easy! You'll just have to seduce them!”

  There was a moment of stunned silence. The wolf frozen on the spot and radio static through the ear piece, before Zira slowly turned her head to face Ajax and an eruption of laughter came from Ruger. Ajax kept the same neutral face.

  Zira nervously laughed. 

  “Your not serious!”

  She turned to Ajax and her smile disappeared. Ajax was still looking at her. That was definitely his serious face.

_   “You do know who your talking about right?”  _ Ruger chipped in. 

  Ajax didn't say a word. 

  “Your kidding, right? I'm about as seductive as a cabbage!”

 Ajax continued to stare for a moment before once again opening his mouth.

  “Come on! It's simple!”

   “Have you ever  _ seen _ me try to flirt before, Ajax?”

_    “I once saw her trip over a crack in sidewalk at the park while hitting on this one dude. She fell directly into the pond and drenched him.”  _ Ruger unhelpful added.

  Zira nodded vigorously, trying to be as convincing as possible.

  “He's right! I don't do seduction! It is physically impossible for me to flirt and do it even half-decently! You can put me in a room with eleven armed men and a gun and I'll come out alive, but put me in a room with one and tell me to flirt and I'll end up on the floor.”

  Ajax rolled his purple eyes. 

  “It can't be THAT bad. Come on, try to hit on me!”

  “Do I have too?”

  Ajax stared her down unrelentlessly while Ruger chanted a chorus of “DO IT! DO IT!” in the background. After a minute of holding her ground, she finally sighed.

  “Fine.” 

   Ajax's eyes lit up like Christmas lights. He jumped on his feet a bit as if he were a child receiving a long-awaited gift.

  Zira sighed, tasting the city on her tongue and feeling the chill bite at her fur. Winter wasn’t quite over yet, but was reaching its last legs. She was thankful for her leather jacket. Zira brushed its shoulders as she thought of how to proceed with the current situation. Finally making up her mind, and trying to move past the awkwardness, she approached Ajax on the roof.

  “Are you from Tennessee?” Zira stuttered through the sentence. “Cause your the only 10 I see!” 

   Zira ended the pickup line with a wink and a finger gun. Ajax stared unamused at the wolf. Ruger started laughing so hard, Zira thought he was going to suffocate. The wheezing that came from the other side of the line was loud enough that it made her ears ring a bit. 

  “That was the most depressing thing I’ve ever seen.” Ajax pinched the bridge of his nose. “I’ve got my work cut out for me.”

   Zira’s smile broke. “What do you mean by ‘Work cut out for you’?”

   “Well obviously I've got to teach you how to flirt.”

  At this Ruger once again became hysterical. _ “You..Hah..You think you can fix all of...that,” _ he said between his laughter, _ “Did you even see the finger guns?” _

__ Both Ajax and Zira froze at the last sentence glancing between each other in silent confusion. 

  Ajax tentatively spoke. “Do you have eyes on us?”

_   “To the left.” _

  The duo looked to the left to see a camera mounted on a neighboring building. They watched as it moved side to side as if someone was shaking their head. How had they not noticed it before?

  “ _ Don't worry I've redirected the footage here. It'll be like you were never there.” _

  Ajax shrugged, satisfied with the answer. He turned back to Zira, black jacket flapping a bit from the sudden motion.

  “If we want to get home by 3:30 then we better get started.”

     Zira weighed her options. This was really going to suck, but the longer she resisted, the later she would be out. She decided with some disgruntlement that she might as well go along with Ajax’s flirting class.

  Ajax puffed out his chest and walked back and forth in front of Zira as if he was a Boot Camp sergeant.

  “Step 1: Make eye contact! Eyes are the door to your soul. When romantically interested, the one doing the courting always makes eye contact. If you want this to be believable, your going to have to as well. “

  Zira nodded her head, and tried to follow along.

  “This part should be easy. Give it a try! Make eye contact with me.”

  And oh boy did Zira try. Problem was that she may have tried a little too hard.

 “What are you staring at me like that?”

  “You told me to make eye contact.” 

   “Yes, I told you to make eye contact, not stare into my soul!”

  “Didn't you say that eyes were supposed to be doors to the soul?”

 “Yes but not in a creepy way!”

  The two were cut off by the sound of crunching through the ear piece.

   “We losing connection Ruger?” Zira asked.

  There was a short span of just crunching before Ruger chirped back.

  “ _ Nah I just went and grabbed some popcorn. _ ” The crunching resumed.

  They practiced a bit more until Zira had the eye contact thing somewhat under control and moved on to smiling. This was no issue for Zira and came naturally (to the thankfulness of Ajax). With this down, they moved onto the next step (this was also the one Ajax was worried about the most).

  “Ok, so obviously you're going to have to initiate conversation.”

  Zira took a deep breath in exhaustion. This was way too much work. 

  “Make sure you keep it light hearted, and for god's sake don't use  any more of those damn pickup lines.”

  “What should I say?”

  “Compliment them! Ask for a number! Just something to get the conversation going. You need to communicate through body language too. Be open and inviting! Crossing your arms and shit won't make it seem genuine.”

  Zira uncrossed her arms and widened her stance a bit. 

  “Like this?”she asked.

   “Better!” Ajax responded.

  This went on until Ruger (having run out of popcorn and at some point having been joined by a tired and slightly peeved Rino) reminded them that it was now 2:54 and if the still wanted to be back by 3:30 they had to hurry up. 

  On Ajax’s advice, they made a small detour to a 24 hour convenience store, where Zira bought a small bouquet of roses to hopefully woo whichever guard she decided to single out. Walking towards the front of the building now, Zira tried her best to gather herself. She held the red flowers in her right hand, and was careful not to accidentally ram them into her leg as she walked. 

  “This is such bullshit.” She muttered to herself.

   As she got closer to the front entrance, the guards took notice and began to walk over to her. One stayed behind by the door. Their hands hovered over the pistols strapped to their waists and they're eyes followed her every move. 

  Zira watched as Ajax reached around the side of the building from the shadows, stabbing the guard by the door in the back with one clawed hand and muffling his scream with the other. He pulled the body into the darkness, effectively making the guard disappear, before giving a small nod to Zira and bolting into the building to get the gas set up.

  Scanning her eyes over the three guards (two cats and a dog), she mentally searched for weapons and weak points. They all had the same Glock 19 and the lighter colored cat had a slight limp in their step. She chose a guard at random to flirt with, happening to be the dog. 

  Forcing a smile to her face, she uncomfortably walked over. She hated moving so openly.  Zira tried to sway her hips a bit like she had seen in the movies, but only got a few raised eyebrows. A chuckle came from Ruger over the ear piece. 

_   “Over exaggerating the hip thing, Zira.”  _ Rino’s voice crackled with sleep. Ruger probably woke him up with his hysterics. 

  Zira mentally scolded herself, but kept the same outward appearance. She tried her best to fix her walk.

  “Who the hell are you?” Asked the dog in a mildly threatening voice.

   Zira suddenly forgot what she was going to say. Racking her brain for answers, she was not paying attention to her feet, and almost tripped. Luckily she caught herself from actually falling, although she stumbled a bit. Looking back to the flowers in her hand and to the dog, she awkwardly held them out to him. Between the uncomfortable staring, a petal fell unceremoniously to the ground, perfectly exhibiting Zira's inner turmoil. Panicking, she thought back to her flirting lessons. What would Ajax do?

    “I uh...saw you across the street and couldn't help but see your beautiful…” she squinted through the darkness, trying to find out the guard’s fur color, “Brown! Brown fur and lovely-” What did normal people find sexually attractive? “toned  muscles!”

   The guards stared at her with a mix of confusion and pity. Zira still nervously held the roses in her hand. God this was torture. 

  After a moment of nothing happening, Zira pulled in her anxiety and tried to escalate the conversation. Ajax shouldn't be much longer.                 

  “So, you come here often?” Zira squinted slightly in recoil at her terrible execution. She could hear laughter on the other end of the ear piece. The guard frowned at her unamused.

  “That's classified information,” he said, “You shouldn't even be here.”

  “Well you know what they say.”

  There was silence as the guard raised an eyebrow at her.

  “What?” 

  It was more said like a command than a question. Panicking, Zira said the first thing that came to mind.

  “You can't teach an old dog new tricks!”

   Shit that was terrible. She could here a whispered  _ “What the fuck” _ from Ajax over the ear piece and more muffled laughter. What was she even thinking! 

   The guard closed his eyes, pinched the bridge of his nose and let out an exasperated sigh.

  “Just check her for weapons.”

  They were going to find her pistols and knife. She was fucked. 

  The two cats approached her and began to pat her down. Like she suspected they found her guns, but caught up on the discovery of Whipper and Snapper they missed the knife hidden in her boot. The two cats grabbed her by the arms and held her in place, jostling her injured shoulder, eliciting a quiet ‘ow’ from the wolf.

  The cats took her semi-automatic handguns, passing them to dog. The dog looked at them for a moment before tossing them to the side. Zira watched as her pistols skidded over the rough ground away from her.

  “BE CAREFUL WITH THOSE! THEY’RE TOP OF THE LINE!”

  The dog rolled his eyes, walking over to one of the guns and giving it a light kick in spite. Zira seethed. 

  “ _ Uh oh.” _

_   “What?” _

_   “He kicked Whipper” _

_   “Uh oh.” _

  She could faintly hear the conversation over the COM, but was now focused on her targets. The switch had been flipped. She was in work mode now.

  “You know, I'm sorry about this, I really am, but we can't have armed intruders snooping around. It's the reason I have a job in the first place.”

   Zira sensed this would be a long monolog. She didn't have time for this shit.

  “2-o” Zira said into the earpiece that the guards had somehow also missed. Seriously how stupid could they be. 

  “What did you say?” the dog snapped. When Zira didn't respond, he shook her, jumbling her shoulder again. 

  “What did you do?”

  “I give it three minutes tops depending.” she replied light-heartedly. 

  “Give what three minutes tops? Depending on what?”

   Zira deadpanned, making eye contact with him.

  “How many of your ‘coworkers’ are still alive.”

   At that moment a silver knife found its way into one of the cat’s skull. The distraction and the now free arm give Zira some leg room so to speak. She ducked down, and in a fluid motion seeped the legs out from under the remaining cat. She grabbed the knife hidden in her boot, quickly stabbing the guard while he was down.

  The remaining guard was the dog, who by now had processed what was happening and was currently aiming a gun at Zira's face. The wolf quickly moved toward him, a move he had not thought the assassin would make. After all, who moves toward a loaded gun?

  He found out quickly why, as her left arm wrapped around his, trapping it and subsequently the gun behind her. With her left, she delivered an uppercut to the dogs jaw, and rammed her forehead into his. Stunned and seeing stars, the guard dropped his Glock. 

   Zira slipped behind him, putting the dog into a chokehold. He clawed at the leather around his throat, earning a tighter hold and a hard stomp to the foot. Zira's grin was feral.

   “You know, I'm sorry about this, I really am, but we can't have pathetic people like you kicking my guns around.”

  The dog made a gurgling sound in response to Zira's sarcastic imitation.

  With a quick movement of her arm, she broke guards neck with a sickening crack. She stared at the body for a minute before kicking him much in the same manner he had done to her pistol. The assassin made her way to where Whipper and Snapper were laying, picking them up and inspecting the slight scuff on Whipper. She grumbled out a few insults to the body  before speaking into the ear piece again.

  “Guards down.”

  In about 5 minutes, Ajax was outside of the building standing next to Zira, who was still frowning at the marks. 

  “You really couldn't take on three guards by yourself?”

  “Shoulder.” The wolf glared at him. 

   “You wouldn't have had to worry about it if you had just followed my flirting advice.”

_ “We did warn you.”  _ Ruger once again spoke through the COM.

   Ajax rolled his eyes before muffling a yawn.

  “What's the time, Ruger?” Zira asked.

_   “About 3:25.” _

__ Turning back to Ajax, she strapped her pistols to her belt. 

  “Let's blow this place and call it a night.”

  Ajax nodded and produced a match from his pocket. He lit it and dropped it on a small trail of gasoline. The two sprinted a little ways away and turned to watch the building as it exploded in an array of reds and oranges. Zira could feel the heat on her face and smiled it a bit.

   “It sure is beautiful isn't it?” Ajax said, not looking away from the fire.

  “It sure is.”

_ “Just get the hell home so I can sleep!” _


End file.
